The roughly $12 million State Racing Fund is propped up by a mix of licensing fees, admissions taxes and taxes on rounding of payouts, according to a 2104 report by state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale.

But under state law, none of the licensing fees on horses, jockeys and owners can exceed $100. None of the racetracks charge admissions, so regulators have imposed a fee of 3 cents per person that goes to the track. And then there is the rounding off of wagers. Tracks round winnings down to the nearest dime, meaning that if a bettor wins $20.71, the track shaves a penny off of the payout. That penny is taxed at 25 percent.

That hasn’t been enough to cover the cost of personnel at the state racing commission and drug testing on horses.

“The system is broken, and it needs to be fixed,” Redding said.

To bridge the gap, the racing commission has in some cases simply billed the Department of Agriculture, or it has turned to another fund -- a tax on slot machines that was designed to increase purses for winning horses and help build the state’s horse racing industry overall.

That fund, the Pennsylvania Horse Race Development Fund, brought in more than $242 million in 2014, but has been regularly tapped by the Pa. General Assembly to plug budget gaps.